We are excited to announce that on Friday, April 13, 2012 the Native American Studies Graduate Student Association will host the 1st Annual Native American Studies Graduate Student Symposium. This year’s symposium theme is “Engaging the Indigenous Americas.” In efforts to build interdisciplinary dialogue and promote scholarship and activism that will benefit our Academic and Native communities, we welcomed proposals from all current UC Davis graduate students whose research critically addresses the issues, concerns, and lives of Indigenous peoples of the Americas.

There is often discussion of the importance of interdisciplinary approaches to Indigenous research, but we wanted to see what that would actually look like in practice. Our vision was to find out who was studying Native communities, histories, languages, and practices on campus so we could start talking. Our hope was and is to not only make networks for future collaborations but to form a larger community on the UC Davis campus, bringing together graduate students with a sense of investment in the betterment of the lives and peoples of the Indigenous Americas. In the future, we hope to expand the symposium to include other UC campuses and community members. For now, by sticking to the Davis campus we are afforded the opportunity and experience of putting together a more manageably-sized symposium for the first time around, which was both rewarding and challenging.

We are grateful to the Department of Native American Studies for co-hosting this unique event. Professors Inés Hernández-Avila, Martha Macri, and Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie were also very supportive and their participation adds a level of awesomeness to our program. Many others also answered the call for symposium planning, especially Tina Tansey and Stella Mancillas whose dedication to NAS student and department projects never wavers. Brook Colley, Cutcha Risling Baldy, Angel Hinzo, and Matthew Casey all worked hard to secure funding and without them this event would not be possible. Cutcha’s experience and expertise brought a much-needed sense of organization and confidence to this project. Brook’s suggestion to video record panels in order to create an archive allows us to share our work beyond our campus and we hope to post those as they become available. History Ph.D. candidate Ryan Tripp’s enthusiasm to join our project made it abundantly clear that the need for interdepartmental collaboration is both necessary and urgent on the UC Davis campus. Our presenters and moderators answered this call for collaboration as evidenced by the wide range of participating disciplines: Native American Studies, Anthropology, Comparative Literature, Community Development, Cultural Studies, English, History, and Spanish & Portuguese. Sarah Laudenslayer at the Women’s Recruitment and Retention Center dedicated not only her design vision but also her time and patience to develop promotional materials for the symposium. Lastly, thank you to Alicia María Siu whose artwork Iyat Pahtli (Tobacco Medicine) embodies the hemispheric approach that we wish to bring to the symposium and our research, reminding us that creative approaches to Indigenous knowledge are invaluable and honored.

Did we mention that there will be snacks? :) We will have free flowing coffee, tea, water, and munchies in addition to our keynote luncheon and dessert reception. We hope that you join us for this exciting day of exchange as we engage the Indigenous Americas!

A special thanks to all of our sponsors:

Department of Native American Studies
College of Letters and Sciences: Division of Arts & Cultural Studies
Graduate Student Association
Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Resource Center
Native American Studies Graduate Student Association
Office of Graduate Studies
Student Recruitment and Retention Center
UC Davis Native American Faculty Association
Women’s Resources and Research Center

Thank you once again from the Native American Graduate Student Symposium Committee Co-Chairs
- Patricia Killelea and Christine M. Willie

UCD NAS Graduate Students Cutcha Risling Baldy and Brook Colley worked as part of the "Native Arts, Voices & Perspectives Project" which completed artist feature videos about Native American artists from Northern California. The project was completed by the Native Women's Collective where Cutcha and Brook are both members. From the Native Women's Collective Website:

Thanks to a grant from the Seventh Generation Fund and support from the Ink People Center for the Arts and Center for Indian Community Development we are so happy to be premiering the first of THREE videos about some of the local artists from the Northern California area. The first video featured is for artist Marlette Grant- Jackson.  Featured artists for these videos include: SuWorhrom David Baldy, Kateri Masten, Marlette Grant-Jackson and David Mata.

Cutcha Risling Baldy was the director and project coordinator for the videos. Brook Colley worked as the videographer. This is the first of three videos.

Congratulations to Brook!

The American Indian Quarterly
Volume 35, Number 4, Fall 2011E-ISSN: 1534-1828 Print ISSN: 0095-182X
Decolonizing the Lens of Power: Indigenous Films in North America (review) 
Brook Colley
You can find the the entire review here: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/american_indian_quarterly/summary/v035/35.4.colley.html

An excerpt: Kerstin Knopf's book Decolonizing the Lens of Power: Indigenous Films in North America focuses on Native American and First Nations films and filmmakers as they create what she calls an "answering discourse" to the media-validated colonial discourse. Knopf samples a variety of Native American filmmaking genres, including documentary, short films, and full-length narrative films, providing a detailed synopsis and content analysis of several films. Since its genesis in the early 1900s, film has been an effective colonizing tool, impacting Indigenous peoples around the globe. Films varied from ethnographic documentaries depicting "exotic" and "vanishing" tribes to Hollywood narrative cinema depicting Natives as a savage race that must be exterminated or subdued to make room for Christian civilization. Like many forms of media, film has been used by those with power to generate propaganda, manufacture stereotypes, foster racism, and create in the popular imagination widely accepted justifications for genocide, land theft, and other forms of oppression. Both Canada and the United States have used state-sponsored films to legitimate their settler governments and land claims within their borders. As filmmaking became an accessible visual art form for Native American and First Nations peoples, it became a medium and tool used to express creativity, educate, and advocate for change.

Brook Colley is an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians of North Carolina with Wasco, Japanese, and Irish heritage. Brook was raised in Corvallis, Oregon, attended Southern Oregon University, and is now a graduate student in Native American Studies at University of California Davis. Her research interests include Tribal health and healing; Oregon Tribes; Kiksht speaking peoples; Indian Gaming and the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act; Federal Indian policies and laws; Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation act; videography sovereignty; and Contemporary forms of resistance, sovereignty, and self-determination; Tribal governance and community development; Native women; Native art as a form of resistance; Cherokee Pottery revivals. Learn more about her here. 

The "Uneasy Remains" Film is a project of Wren Usdi Productions, a film production company run by NAS Grad Students Brook Colley and Cutcha Risling Baldy (along with UCD English Grad Student Gina Caison). The project also involves several grad students from the NAS department and other departments across the UCD Campus.

The Uneasy Remains Film Project and Research Interest Group examines the history of studying and collecting Indigenous human remains at UC Davis and how this history has been informed by the federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. The film also queries the gendered dynamics of this history as it relates to academic research and the representations of Indigenous bodies. the project represents a collaborative effort of local tribes, community members, and students in multiple disciplines and departments at UC Davis. It brings these groups into dialogue on this complex issue and aims to promote interdisciplinary educational opportunities for students interested in learning more about the history of the study of Indigenous human remains and repatriation movements. the project will result in a feature length film, curriculum materials, and an archive database of research materials for use by tribes, schools, and other organizations. Although the project examines UC Davis as a case study for these issues, this dialogue has implications for museums and Native groups throughout the nation and globe, as access to human remains and repatriation movements represent a significant node in the ongoing conversation regarding the human rights struggles of Indigenous peoples. So far the Uneasy Remains Research Interest Group includes a network of 25 students and the support of several faculty members. Currently, the project is supported by the UC Davis Consortium for Women and Research, the Yocha Dehe Endowed Chair in Native American Studies, and the Native Women's Collective. For more information, please email uneasyremains@gmail.com.

On May 19-21, the UC Davis Department of Native American Studies hosted the official meeting of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA). The program featured three days of presentations and activities. Several UCD NAS Grad Students presented including:

Brook Colley & Gina Caison: Uneasy Remains: Backyard Documentary, Human Remains, and the University of
California, Davis

Angel Hinzo: One People, Two Nations: The Ho-Chunk/Winnebago and the Implications of the
2000 Enrollment Addendum

Patricia Killelea: Between These Songs: Sherwin Bitsui’s Decolonizing Poetics in “Floodsong”

Cutcha Risling Baldy: NAGPRA 20 Years Later: What Works

Abel Ruiz: Indigenous GIS Mapping: Past and present challenges

James D. Sarmento: Reclamation and Revitalization: identity and language ideology in Native American
Studies

Silvia Soto: Zapatismo and the Buried Knowledges of an Indigenous Consciousness

Christine Willie: Meet at the Top: Diné Knowledge and Scientific Knowledge Contemplate Dibé

The "Uneasy Remains" Film Project has received a $5,000 grant from the Seventh Generation Fund for Indian Development and a $1,800 grant from the Center for Collaborative Research for an Equitable California (CCREC).

The "Uneasy Remains" Film is a project of Wren Usdi Productions, a film production company run by NAS Grad Students Brook Colley and Cutcha Risling Baldy (along with UCD English Grad Student Gina Caison). The project also involves several grad students from the NAS department and other departments across the UCD Campus.

The Uneasy Remains Film Project and Research Interest Group examines the history of studying and collecting Indigenous human remains at UC Davis and how this history has been informed by the federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. The film also queries the gendered dynamics of this history as it relates to academic research and the representations of Indigenous bodies. the project represents a collaborative effort of local tribes, community members, and students in multiple disciplines and departments at UC Davis. It brings these groups into dialogue on this complex issue and aims to promote interdisciplinary educational opportunities for students interested in learning more about the history of the study of Indigenous human remains and repatriation movements. the project will result in a feature length film, curriculum materials, and an archive database of research materials for use by tribes, schools, and other organizations. Although the project examines UC Davis as a case study for these issues, this dialogue has implications for museums and Native groups throughout the nation and globe, as access to human remains and repatriation movements represent a significant node in the ongoing conversation regarding the human rights struggles of Indigenous peoples. So far the Uneasy Remains Research Interest Group includes a network of 25 students and the support of several faculty members. Currently, the project is supported by the UC Davis Consortium for Women and Research, the Yocha Dehe Endowed Chair in Native American Studies, and the Native Women's Collective. For more information, please email uneasyremains@gmail.com.